Tell me about it. 
When our electric goes out in the winter, we have no heat and no water. Without stored water, each toilet can be flushed once. So I have a bunch of jugs of water in the basement for filling the toilets.
I don’t know why more people don’t have a standby generator. Hurricanes happen. Ice storms happen. Summer thunderstorms and other things happen. Not to everyone every year, but the security and satisfaction just can’t be beat.
We’ve been in this house near Atlanta for 20 years now. We have had extended power outages maybe 5 times, with 7 days being the longest. Still, not having to worry about freezing, driving on ice to find a hotel, keeping the kids and pets safe and in their routine - it’s so nice.
For 800 to 2,000 bucks initial outlay for an average home, it’s worth every penny.
You apartment dwellers? Get a Honda generatorand put it on the patio or balcony! Couple of extension cords and you’re stylin’! And no one will know you have it, because they’re so freaking quiet.
That said, with the crippling, catastrophic, ice storm we just had here in Atlanta, we never lost power. With 6 million people in the metro area, only 200k lost power for 2 days, and all should be restored by tomorrow.
Still, better safe than sorry. 
It’s definitely worth every penny but for us it was at least $4K.
Yeah, us too. One good tip is that when you think the power might go out, fill up the bathtub. You can use it a pitcherful at a time to flush.
When my area had an ice storm, the power outages lasted a lot longer (for some people) than the ice on the roads. I think the main roads were clear within 12 hours, but the back of my neighborhood was out of power for 8 days.
When I built my house I put in a generator that can power the entire house and draws directly from the natural gas line, certainly wasn’t cheap though, it was a little over $10,000 installed.
I was spending a lot of money on the home and have lived many times for too long without power…I basically decided something that was a 2% increase to the price of the home was worth it for me.
I have to disagree with the assertion that heat waves without A/C are more dangerous than winter weather. Yes, some old people die in heat waves, especially in countries where the temperatures very rarely are over 100 F and many homes don’t actually have central air. But it’s often primarily older people who are on death’s door as it is and who aren’t properly cared for during the heat wave as many caregivers in those countries probably don’t recognize the dangerous of heat stroke.
During Theodore Roosevelt’s administration one of the reasons he was so involved in negotiations over the massive nationwide coal miner strike was because his advisers had informed him that thousands in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast, where homes were still overwhelmingly heated by coal stoves or furnaces, would die from freezing without coal supplies during the winter. Cold kills, and fairly easily and quickly. At Denison University (small college in a small town in Ohio) it was around 20 F last week and a college student left a bar around 2 AM and apparently fell asleep outside (probably drunk, laid down on a bench or something and passed out…but still), he froze to death. He had a jacket on and was a young healthy guy, but you can die very, very quickly from exposure to the cold. In the trifecta of “food, water, shelter” I’ve always been taught that if you end up in a true survival situation shelter is actually your number one, especially in extreme weather environments like a frozen wilderness. You can actually survive for weeks without food so that should be your last priority, and while you can’t live too long without water you can actually die quicker from exposure than thirst and aside from a few select scenarios it is actually unlikely you end up somewhere with no water supply in any case.
I’ve a passive solar house that I used to heat exclusively with wood. I would go through 6 cords a year.
Lots of work.
Don’t get too many power outages, but we are in pretty good shape. Our propane stove will take care of heat now. While we would lose well water, I have a clean stream on the property that runs year round.
As an owner of an ancient gas furnace, I was thrilled during Sandy that I could manually fire it up and keep the house warm. Between that and having hot water, the main issue was the refrigerator. I lucked out and got an LED lantern powered by 8 D-Cell batteries that lasted the whole outage.
Yes, when my father got the house where he did, at the end of the electric lines where power goes out frequently, I made my move in contingent on his putting in a standby generator. Ours doesn’t run everything so it wasn’t quite as high as yours, but it’s enough to still use most spaces. It is tied into the propane. I figure it will make the house more attractive when I have to sell it.
Thanks man. I didn’t even have to call. I was given a free nights stay when I checked out.
One thing I used to have that was handy was a very small portable TV I bought for a few bucks at a garage sale and fixed up. It could run off D-batteries or a car lighter socket. We’d turn it on a couple times a day to check the local news.
Notice I used to have it. With the switch over to digital, it became utterly useless. Could get a new, digital one for less than $100, but seems a waste for how little it would be used.
I have city water and a gas fireplace augmented by kerosene heaters. Cold beer, warm showers and light from LED flashlights. I can charge my phone and laptop off the car.